Deep Impact

I had a wisdom tooth extracted yesterday, although the word extracted is a little misleading. It had to be drilled and cut up, then pulled out in slivers — similar to how you might remove a cork that was stuck too far down the neck of a wine bottle, only with a lot more blood. I could follow the progress of this tedious procedure only by studying the changing facial expressions of my oral surgeon, a small man with a lyrical Lebanese accent and a penchant for looks of sheer perplexity. It was as though, with me seated in his chair, he realized for the first time that he really did have to rely on that dime-sized handheld mirror to see what he was doing. There are countless mysteries I associate with dentistry, including the primary question of why in the world anyone would choose to be involved in such a disgusting profession. But that ranks just slightly ahead of any attempt to understand how it’s possible to perform the required intricate maneuvers inside a patient’s mouth with so little opportunity to see what’s going on in there. I have trouble clipping a wayward eyebrow hair while looking directly into the mirrored door of my medicine cabinet from a distance of three inches. He was exploring the space in the most remote region of my lower jaw and, it seemed to me, working almost blind.

The culprit was a tooth that had grown horizontally below the gum and had butted its stupid head right up against the flank of the back molar. The problem wasn’t the wisdom tooth itself, which had lain in its sideways position for decades. The trouble was a pocket that had formed between the two teeth, a warm, dark space that could accommodate food particles and bacteria, and would eventually cause the loss of the molar, an innocent bystander caught in the crossfire of a senseless conflict.

My love of justice, of course, caused me to demand some rational explanation for the impasse. Months ago, when the dental hygienist announced that she could now insert her metal probe to a depth of eight millimeters into the pocket, it attracted a crowd of two other hygienists, the dentist herself, and three salesmen from the shoe store across the street.

“What’s causing this?” I wanted to know. I waited for the mob to disperse before asking the question, because I felt it was a private matter and none of their business. But really. I brush, I floss, I massage my gums. I even squirt warm water into the pocket with a plastic syringe. What was going on?

An x-ray revealed the deviant wisdom tooth, lying on its side and trying to grow in a lateral direction. I couldn’t fathom why something with the word wisdom in its name seemed to have less intelligence than a mushroom, which is a fungus that grows from dead tree stumps, yet manages to find its way out. Do my wisdom teeth lack a sense of purpose? Why do I have only three? And why are they hiding?

According to an online article by Rachele Cooper, wisdom teeth are “the evolutionary answer to our ancestor’s early diet of coarse, rough food – like leaves, roots, nuts and meats – which required more chewing power and resulted in excessive wear of the teeth. The modern diet with its softer foods, along with marvels of modern technologies such as forks, spoons and knives, has made the need for wisdom teeth nonexistent. As a result, evolutionary biologists now classify wisdom teeth as vestigial organs, or body parts that have become functionless due to evolution.”

I don’t know. That sounds pretty shaky to me. Do the teeth suddenly realize we’re now cooking our carrots and potatoes, and take a last-second turn to avoid erupting through the gums? Wouldn’t a few extra teeth be beneficial, no matter what we’re eating? I had a sandwich on French bread just last week, and I could’ve used some help.

Whatever the reason, this one had to come out. So there I was at two-thirty in the afternoon, assuring the doctor yet again that I didn’t want a general anesthetic.

“It’ll be unpleasant for you to be awake,” he said. “The sounds. The things you’ll see. Maybe some smoke.”

“Smoke?”

“From the cutting. We have to go through tooth and bone.”

I was sure I’d be fine. Anyway, while he worked I planned to leave, mentally, and walk the beaches of Thailand, or climb the mountains of Peru. If I was going to see smoke, it would be from a distant volcano, or a bonfire on the shore.

He gave me three shots of a local painkiller in rapid succession and the left side of my mouth quickly grew numb. The knife that sliced open my gum felt like a pencil with a dull point. This was going to be a cinch. I was off to the beach.

My stroll was soon interrupted by the sound of a drill, and a man’s voice telling me that I was going to feel a little pressure. I’ve heard that line before. It means that my head is about to be teleported to a spaceship orbiting a distant planet, where my brain will be injected with a powerful acid that, on Earth, would evaporate iron. The surgeon was pulling and twisting on the tooth, seeming to expect that it would just surrender to his efforts. He’d already told me this would be a tough extraction, but he still looked surprised. Then began about thirty minutes of alternating between drilling and yanking. He was cutting away at the bone and breaking the tooth apart. Every few minutes he’d sound pleased as he removed another red shard. I did see smoke, and an impressive spray of saliva and bits of something. I looked up at his face, inches from my own, and saw that his mask was decorated with hundreds of tiny pink dots. “How unusual,” I thought, before catching on that I was looking at my own blood.

In my mind I wandered back to the supermarket I’d visited just before arriving for my appointment. I needed to get some soft foods, and stocked up on tomato soup, strawberry yogurt, rice pudding, and applesauce. Unexpectedly, I also scored eight 32-ounce packages of spaghetti for a dollar apiece. As the doctor continued to remove fragments from my mouth, I calculated that I’d purchased more than sixty meals for less than ten dollars. This was, for me, a major fiscal accomplishment, one that compared favorably to those of recent business school graduates, people half my age who are making a fortune buying and selling corn, coffee, and crude oil futures by simply waving their arms and yelling a lot in the financial districts of major cities around the globe. Actually, I consoled myself with the comforting thought that I’m living in the moment, and have no real interest in futures.

And then, it was over. They took another x-ray and the area appeared to be clean. The wisdom tooth is gone and so is, I guess, the dreaded pocket. One fewer functionless body part to worry about. Another day or two of yogurt and applesauce, and by the weekend my spaghetti investment will start to pay off.

* * * * *

By the way, if you’re interested in learning more about impacted wisdom teeth and gum disease, and feel tempted toward some online research, don’t do it. The photographs alone will keep you awake for about a week and a half.

Oh no!! Wishing you a speedy recovery. At one point my dentist mentioned that as a possibility and so far (knock on wood) he never said it again. Having never been under anesthesia that’s the part that terrified me. Plus the fact I had to watch my son go through it and witness his dribbling a shake down his face unaware thanks to the numbing and groggy mind. It was humorous to watch his attempts to scribble nonsense requests on paper since he couldn’t talk.

I had the same experience with my son, Melinda. But, as he has reminded me several times, he had all four wisdom teeth out, while I had just one. I hope you can continue to avoid the experience for yourself.

I’m so sorry you had to endure such pain, but so happy you shared it mainly because your eloquent telling of the story had me laughing. I’m also grateful that I had all four of my wisdom teeth pulled at the same time under general anesthetic about 10 years ago (although they did damage a nerve, which caused unbelievable pain for about three days afterward). I can’t handle it when a specialist looks confused about something they see on me.

I hope your recovery is relatively pain-free, although I also hope it generates more stories for you to share with us. I hope your mental trip to Peru was as lovely as I’ve heard mental trips to Peru can be. It’s supposed to be beautiful there, mentally, this time of year. I also hope your wisdom tooth learned its lesson and other teeth took note about the fate that befalls them if they step out of line.

I had an almost identical experience last October. Well, not quite identical. Unlike you, I begged, pleaded, and cried like a little baby for general anesthesia. My dentist was of the biologic (holistic) genre and would not even consider snowing me to Peru.

I was not able to write about the whole sordid affair, but I am sure glad you did. Haven’t laughed this hard since yesterday when I started reading my new copy of “Who Knew, My reluctant journey to blogging addiction” by who else? Charles Gulotta.

I thought most oral surgeons would prefer to have their patients asleep and out of the way. Mine tried repeatedly to convince me, but I needed to drive myself home. Also, sometimes it’s better to feel the pain than to avoid it.

Hi,
I’m sorry to hear you had so much trouble with your wisdom tooth, not nice at all to have to go through something like that. You were very brave not to have general anesthetic, when I had mine out I went under.
I love the way you have found some humor in this trip to the dentist, and at the same time brought a smile to my face as well. Enjoy your spaghetti.

I’m so sorry to hear about your “run in” (a la hit-man style) with the dentist. The Dentist actually sounds like the name of a hit man, now that I think of it.

There’s a reason WHY that scene in Marathon Man with Dustin Hoffman and Sir Lawrence Olivier is so horrifying, it’s because we can FEEL the pain by watching it, and let’s face it, two Oscar winning actors who essentially defined their generations doesn’t hurt either.

Anyhow, I hope you feel better soon. I hope no other wisdom teeth pack up and move to other parts of your mouth with oversized luggage that doesn’t fit into the overhead bin, ’cause, that’s just not right.

Ouch!! Sorry, brother. Not something you would wish on anyone (except maybe the oral surgeon) but it still made me laugh! I know it’s a cliche but it fits – been there, done that. Feel better 🙂
PS – The smoke part made me think of Cosby – “smoke, smoke, smoke!”

Who knew wisdom teeth could serve such an honourable purpose as entertaining your readers. I’m glad you’re rid of this ‘appendix of the mouth’ and hope you feel better soon.
By the way, how did you prevent frostbite on your cheek?

I’ve had some nasty teeth/gum “procedures” myself. Luckily I’ve been the recipient of GOOD DRUGS — not of the pain-killer kind — but of the I-don’t-give-a-crap-what-you-do-in-there variety. One time, my doctor told me that during my procedure, I had gone to scratch my nose, not been able to find it, and had shouted at her “I NEVER GAVE YOU PERMISSION TO TAKE MY NOSE !”.

oh my gosh i am laughing so hard! i don’t freeze, or the freezing doesn’t stay in so i would so opt to be put out!! not even laughing gas works for me, except to make me laugh a little..which is needed under those circumstances! hope you feel better soon and enjoy your spaghetti in the mean time!

What a harrowing tale! I had three impacted wisdom teeth, too, but they eventually developed enough smarts to grow toward the light. The subsequent extractions took less time than it takes to type “subsequent extractions”, assuming you mistype it 16 times the way I just did.

Loved your hilarious description — I say, as I touch the gaping space where I went through a similar experience with a molar last fall. I had a molar that I’d tried to save from a $4,000 root canal a couple years ago which finally again called out for attention, except this time I was in Costa Rica where the cost was going to be $240. But on the final visit I was continuing to have pain; the dentist removed the root canal filling and found that my hole molar had cracked deep down into my gums. He told me it had to come out and right then and then proceeded to load me up with novocaine. Grabbing his pliers, he went to pull it out and shards of tooth popped out of my mouth in several directions. It was an hour and a half later before he had managed to drill, pull, cut, dig and remove the tooth in 10 pieces. All the while I was watching that same expression I’m sure you were watching, but the under-the-breath language spoken was Spanish in terminology I had not yet learned. When I left his office, I was sopping wet from sweating through that ordeal. He offered to reimburse me $80 because the root canal had been unsuccessful!

I nearly threw myself off the golden gate bridge when you didn’t post on Monday. Thankfully I live on the East coast and the thought of driving my sorry butt across the country to commit suicide preventing me from committing to the protest of your lack of post. Hallelujah, you’ve redeemed yourself today and my world is complete again. I’m sorry your world is now one-less tooth. Thanks for making us all laugh at your suffering.

I have always had a secret fascination with tooth stories. Yours was quite good, I must admit. Your own thoughts mirrored so many of mine own…as in, why in the world would anybody in their right mind be a dentist? ! Watching Little Shop of Horrors gave me a clue, but still…horrid, horrid work. Sorry if any dentists are reading.

Having recently experienced my own round of dental hell, I passed on this post at first glance. But I am a sucker for your blog and could not stay away. Shallow breaths, perspiration and a slurp of red wine got me through. I came away chuckling, as always. Here’s to a speedy recovery.

My wisdom teeth have yet to break the surface of my gums, and until I read this blog, I thought I was in the clear. Now I’m seriously bummed. But not because of you. I enjoy reading your posts as much as ever (just wish there were more) and hold nothing against you as a person. But I’m a little upset with your teeth. And cavemen for taking apart live animals with their bicuspids. And evolution.

I hope everything is OK. In all seriousness, hope you feel well enough to eat a box full of milk duds soon. =)

Great post, bronxboy! Laughed out loud lots! And I love the wit of your readers, too. Believe it or not, reading your blog was to be my bedtime story treat. I thought the humor would be relaxing. I’ll let you know if you’ve inspired nightmares instead!

I suggest you get it over with, Eeshan. If you do it soon, there will come a day when someone will ask if you’ve ever had wisdom teeth extracted, and you’ll have to stop and think. The way I did it, I have a feeling this memory will always be fresh.

The oral surgeon is someone whose job it is to pry out a tooth that’s embedded in bone and sealed below the surface of the gums. I guess such a person has to remain emotionally detached and just do what has to be done. If I were in that position, I’d be apologizing the whole time, which would prolong the misery. You might say there’s an element of sadism, but it’s the necessary kind.

The only thing your wisdom teeth lack is a sense of direction, and because they are male, they refuse to ask for directions. There was something very wrong about how funny I found this post. I feel like I should go to confession or something. 😉

Hope you feel better. For the record, I had 4 impacted wisdom teeth removed on the same day (I was not awake) and was sitting in a restaurant sucking down spaghetti with family later that night. Drugs are sometimes very good indeed!

My brother, on the other hand, opted to go without the anesthesia and ended up looking just like you, except I think the oven mitt was avocado green. (It was the 80s.)

Not only do they refuse to ask for directions, but they just keep pushing, even when they run into a wall. I’m glad to hear this experience is far behind you, and your brother, too. There’s no need for confession, Margaret. I’m glad you were amused.

Only the most incredible fortitude could cause an individual to write about such horrors the day after such horrors. 🙂 I like the line “an innocent bystander caught in the crossfire…” The pink dots….too scary for me. Thanks for the fun at your expense of course!

I wrote the post just in time, Terri. The real horror started two days after the extraction — a delayed reaction of swelling and pain caused by something called dry socket. (There’s something about those two words that makes me want to run around the room with my hands over my ears.) Thanks for the nice comment, as always.

Charles – how did you make me laugh at this? I used to be a dental phobic (though not anymore, thankfully or I’d be climbing the walls!) and this was… this was… well, take my word for it, this just was.

At least, afterwards, you didn’t have a mother trying to feed you raspberry jam with a spoon. The seeds get into the… uh… open bits. I had all four wisdom teeth out in one go (under general, thankfully) and couldn’t eat properly for weeks.

Love that you could take your mind off what was going on with a stroll through a virtual supermarket. I used to go in my imagination to a cliff top, then I got a dentist who kept asking me every minute or so ‘are you all right?’ Some dentists are their own worst enemies. I went to someone else after that.

Both the surgeon and his assistant asked me those same questions every few minutes. “How are you doing? Are you all right?” What are the possible answers? I wanted to say, “No. Can we stop right now? I want to go home.” But I didn’t think that was really an option.

Do you know how hard it is to stifle laughter while reading your story hiding behind my fingers? This was hysterical and only made me feel bad because I was laughing at your pain. Oh, I feel for you. Just awful, Charles, you poor man. The cartoons had me howling so hard, (the tooth in your toe!) it almost blocked out the image of bloody shards being ripped from your mouth. The last picture with the oven mitt? Priceless.

My last trip to the dentist yielded pockets that were a “5-6” They recommened something that involved unpleasantness that I won’t even mention here…but GOOD drugs and total blackoutage would be necessary for said procedure. That and a lot of GOOD drugs and soft foods afterward. So sorry you had such an experience – but glad that it’s behind you now. I have to wonder, how on earth do dentists survive emotionally? Nobody loves them:(

Ok..I admit it..the photo did me in. I was hanging by a thread when you wrote this: “innocent bystander caught in the crossfire of a senseless conflict.” and it just went all downhill from there. The photo, as I mentioned, was the last straw. I hate sounding like a donkey, or a flock of geese (Pick an annoying animal sound and go with it) when I laugh really hard. Only for you do I allow these things to happen (and the fact that I was completely alone in my stagnant basement apartment and out of earshot of most of humanity. I think..I will check for stunned mailmen later.

Poor you. Well, here is hoping that the recovery period goes well. Just don’t eat all of the rice pudding at once, not matter how good it tastes. No one wants to see a swollen face at the grocery store when you have to buy more (because it tastes so good).

Those dental hygienists really know how to keep dentists challenged. One found a spot on my tongue which had to be biopsied. What was she doing? She was just supposed to be pulverizing my gums with instruments that belong in the Dark Ages.

“Make sure you use a soft bristle toothbrush”, she said as she grasps a metal pick to scrape layers off my poor teeth. I peeked. It’s a miniature version of an instrument that mountain climbers use for rappelling.

I, too, delude myself over the power to meditate peacefully and refrain from putting my fingernails through the leather on the chair.

Admittedly, I managed to do quite well over a recent oral renovation. I sat for three hours while my poor dentist kept asking if I was sure I was okay. I think he was hoping I’d tell him to stop so he could have a tea break.

Your photo pulls out the maternal instinct of all readers – male and female! 😀

I’ve noticed over the past couple of years that all dental visits seem to be getting longer. What used to be a thirty-minute checkup or cleaning has turned into a two-hour ordeal. I guess it’s better to be thorough, but I don’t feel that way when I’m sitting in the chair, enduring the effects of those mountain climbing tools. Thanks for sharing your experience, Amy. I think your comment could be developed into a post of its own.

I’m terribly impressed that you are able to extract some humour from your experience!
The cracking noise – that is what I remember the most from when my wisdom teeth were broken apart and removed. I don’t remember any part of the experience being funny!

I’m not sure whether to consider you a very brave man or a very foolish one bent on self-torment! The numbing shots alone are enough to have me begging for general anesthesia or–at the very least–a little Valium to calm my nerves and keep me from biting off one of my dentist’s fingers. I enjoyed this immensely–mostly because it was about you and not me! I have forced myself into the dentist’s chair three times in the last month (with one more visit to go), and I plan on rewarding my courage when it is all over (and it won’t be with applesauce or spaghetti). I hope you have recovered completely …

Your post confirmed that my decision to have a general for the ‘extraction’ of my 4 impacted wisdom teeth was a wise one. Perhaps the 4 that were previously pulled without a general prior to my braces being put on, made my choice easier too. I’m sure it’s somewhat perverse to laugh at someone else’s misery, but I couldn’t help it… sorry! Hope you’re on the mend.

Wishing you a speedy recovery, and hope no more teeth pop out your toes (or the side of your jaw or the back of your head)
I had two wisdom teeth cut out once – anesthetics don’t work on me so they smashed me in the head with a brick first – that hurt less than the extraction – and I wasn’t watching puffs of smoke issuing from my mouth like a damp dragon.

Your story sent chills up my spine! “The sounds. The things you’ll see. Smoke.” AHHHHHHHHHHHH! (me screaming) My wisdom teeth were removed in a similar fashion years ago when I was in high school. I remember my jaw turned blue. Did you bruise from the procedure? How are you feeling now?

Going to the dentist freaks me out a bit because I have thing about masked men being two inches from my face. I’m never sure if I’m supposed to keep my eyes open and look at them or not. The whole ordeal is just an awkward abuse of personal space.

I hope you’re feeling well now and are relieved that pesky wisdom tooth is gone!

I never know where to look either, Jessica. It seems weird to have someone that close to your face and not make eye contact, but looking at the dentist would get uncomfortable pretty quickly, too. You’re right — it’s all very awkward. I don’t think anything turned blue. No bruising on the outside, but plenty on the inside. I’m feeling a lot better now.

Oh! I just saw your blog and the picture of the mitt on your face…I wish I was there to make you feel better, as a wife should. But don’t worry, I’ll be home soon Babe and make things all better for you in every way I can. LOVE YOU BABE… Can’t wait to get home! Your one and only loving wife.

There’s nothing you could have done, and when I’m feeling miserable I’d rather be alone, anyway. When I originally posted this, the cartoons and the picture were much smaller; for some reason, they’re appearing bigger than I’d intended, and the size seems to make me look even more pitiful. Thank you for reading this.

I wish you a quick recovery! Getting your wisdom teeth taken out is never fun. I had all four of mine take out when I was 15. It was an experience too crazy to recount here, but it sounds like yours wasn’t as traumatizing as mine was! And for those who haven’t gotten theirs taken out yet…it’s really not so bad…

I don’t think either one of us is going to convince anyone that having your wisdom teeth out isn’t so bad. But getting it done when you’re fifteen is probably the best way to go — then you can milk the story for the rest of your life.

You’re right, Judy. Having to endure the pain and then pay for it on the way out is puzzling. But I guess the process eliminates the potential for future problems. We just have no way of knowing what they would have been — or how much they would have cost.

Yes, we all think the “no general anesthesia” is a good idea until they strap us into the chair and come at us with the power tools. I’ve heard that if you take the general anesthesia, the experience is entirely different. A tooth fairy shows up with a wand and magically disintegrates the tooth. The dentist and hygienist are off watching one of their soap operas.

But with general anesthesia, you wake up feeling confused and out of sync, and saying things that are incoherent. I’m like that most of the time, and was looking for a new experience. If I have to endure it again, though, I may go with the tooth fairy.

OMG, I just read your post and literally cannot believe you underwent this procedure without general anesthesia … are you trying to win the Pain Lottery?? Then, as I was scrolling down through your hundreds of comments (really, Charles, how many fans DO you have??) I saw that, far more importantly, you underwent this procedure while your WIFE was out of town!! You seriously need to baby yourself a LOT more, which you obviously realize with the inclusion of that awful sad hangdog last photo …!
By the way, my brother (the surgeon) decided to just go for the local anesthesia when he got his wisdom teeth removed (I think he was trying to save money and doubtless would have completely approved of your fabulously discounted spaghetti purchase — anyhow, he almost passed out when the dentist started bracing his foot against the chair to put his whole body weight into yanking the tooth out of bone …
Wow, it’s making me feel a bit woozy just writing this! LOVED the illustrations and especially the captions & have to say, you are VERY generous to make us laugh so hard at your misery!

Now that you mention it, the oral surgeon did use his right knee to anchor himself against the chair. There were a couple of moments when I considered a well-placed, completely reflexive, unconscious, and unplanned leg kick of my own, but thought better of it, especially since he was the one holding the pliers.

I hope you are feeling much better! I remember when I was in college, I had to have all four of my wisdom teeth out at the same time, and they were all impacted. It was the worst medical procedure I’d ever been through (this was, of course, before I had children). I won’t recount the details, as I’m sure it’s better if you just try to forget and move on.

But you do raise an interesting question. Why do we have wisdom teeth? And what, exactly, do we lose when we have them out? One time in school, a science teacher told my class that someday people would only have four toes. He claimed that our smallest toe was completely unnecessary. I looked down at my foot in panic. And began to make sure I walked with my foot canted to the side to get good use out of that little toe.

Isn’t it a weird coincidence that I combined the wisdom tooth and toe in that second cartoon? Thanks for the comment, Melissa. I’m glad you have no more impacted teeth to deal with, and yes, keep using those toes.

Can’t believe you didn’t have a general anesthetic for that. They would have had to come to my house and administer the general anesthetic and then cart me to the oral surgeons office. I am such a wimp when it comes to dental procedures. I always get novacaine when I have to get a crown.

I agree that it’s an unsettling experience any time we have teeth worked on, I guess because everything in there is hidden and mysterious and connected to things like roots and nerves and sockets. Thanks for reading, Susan. I hope you won’t be needing Novacane or nitrous oxide for a very long time.

LOL! I had a wisdom tooth where they had to do the exact same thing. I also had a lady who held my hand during the entire procedure while this gorgeous dentist worked on getting it out of there so I at least had some comfort, even though my blood pressure was off the charts out of fear. 🙂

Just hope that you don’t get what I got, something called dry socket early during the healing process; it was almost more painful than having the tooth pulled. And oven mitt to hold the ice against the jaw; man, I never thought of that!

I’m not sure I’ve ever read anything that made me laugh and wince in discomfort in the same moment as many times as this did. I have been feeling a soreness under the gum on the upper right of my jaw that every so often ebbs into genuine pain, and I fear that I too may soon have to undergo a procedure at the dentist. Be well. When I got my bottom wisdom teeth removed (when I had a 4 month old baby who I was breast-feeding and therefore could not partake of the good drugs) someone told me that there were enzymes in pineapples that make your mouth heal more quickly. I drank many pineapple smoothies and was in horrible pain for several weeks. They were delicious though, and who knows, maybe I would have been in agony for months on end without all that pineapple. So get some rest. Drink pineapple smoothies. And keep on writing cringe-worthy humor! You made my day today!

I wonder how long they’ve been doing major dental excavations. A hundred years? A few hundred? However long ago it was that they just let you die rather than put you through the torture of dental excavations–that would have been an awesome time to live.

I had my own dental excavations a few weeks ago. Three hours in the chair. Fate worse than death.

Your comment made me wonder how they’ll do this procedure a hundred years from now. Maybe they’ll just zap the impacted teeth to bits with a hypersonic beam. (I always use the word “zap” when I have no idea what I’m talking about, and I may have made up the word “hypersonic,” as well.)

As always Charles, a brilliant post…while touching the raw nerves of all your readers…I didn’t know what to do…hold my face away from the imaginary sadist…I mean dentist…or myself from laughing at your pain…

I do hope and pray you are well on your way to total recovery from this very brave procedure…I do find it hard to relate to because I want general when I go for a dental check up…what is this universal fear of dentists? It could be due to a total lack of wisdom because my wisdom teeth have luckily not bothered to make an appearance…but I’m not complaining…

How on earth did you sit in the chair while the dentist dug your tooth out of the bone? ouch ouch ouch oh god I feel nauseous just thinking about it… Why didn’t you want the anesthetic?
I also dont like taking unnecessary drugs and I made the mistake of having a colonoscopy without an anesthetic. Oh man it was so painful. During the procedure I heard someone moaning and it took me a while to realize the moaner was me…

I love this post. Your cartoons are exceptionally good, and as everyone commented before me [119 comments! and you reply to each and every one! sheesh!] your story is so gripping, yet so entertaining we cant help but laugh at your pain. Sorry. Hope you’re not still eating jello…

If i wasn’t tempted toward some online research, i wouldn’t have found your article 😉
i have the same case of yours, only yours is extracted, mine is still there 😦 i am planning to go through the surgery by next month and have been postponing for breastfeeding matters.. but to be honest i am terrified and like waiting for the doc to tell me: ah! in your case, the tooth can’t be extracted!!……. oh no prob doc, can i go home now?….
Thank you for sharing your experience!

Oh God. I had mine similarly removed when the “pocket” caused a systemic infection that left me weaving and wobbling for a week. I was much younger then, in my 20’s I think. It was as awful as you describe and the following week was no fun either with the big ol’ chunks of cotton wedged in the hole to staunch the bleeding. ugh.

That experience so traumatized me that it took several years for me to find a dentist who could relieve my anxieties with a mixture of Nitrous Oxide and headphones turned LOUD to Beethoven or Mahler.

I can’t even believe I read this. Only you, Charles could make such an event entertaining to read about.

i know you hate it but i mentioned your blog on my site for the 7×7 award. you don’t have to do anything about it, i just wanted you to know that you have a shout out. i love your blog and your writing!